“You drive me crazy in all the best ways possible, and spending the last couple of months without you has been the most miserable stretch of my life. I miss talking to you, and how sometimes you say the funniest things.”

Her voice was loud, and emphatic, and out of the corner of my eye I saw a woman walking her dog who had stopped to listen to our conversation. Who had stopped to watch Franny as she told me she loved me.

“I miss talking to you too,” was all I could get out. There was so much I wanted to say that it was all tangled in a knot inside my brain. I searched for a thread to pull, to yank out the words that could truly articulate how I felt. But there was panic mixed in, too; Franny always knew exactly what to say. What if my response fell flat?

“You’re funny, do you know that?” she asked, waving her hands at me, her hair bouncing slightly as she talked. “And you’re a great listener, and you’re kind. I love how your cheeks do that.” She gestured toward my face, and I reached up to touch my cheeks, as if there were something on them. “When you’re nervous or thinking. Or both. Also, you’re stupidly hot. I know it’s shallow, but I can’t help it. You’re just hot—it’s a fact. And you’re a good kisser.”

She stopped talking and caught her breath. “So yeah,” she said, her voice quieting a little. “I think that’s all of it.”

Every muscle in my body felt tight, pulled like elastic about to break. I had to tell her. Had to find the courage to put my feelings out into the world, just like she had. But instead, I felt stuck, like I’d been planted there, in the cement.

“You don’t have to say anything,” she said. “And you don’t have to accept my apology. I just want you to know that I’m sorry, and that I love you, and that I wish I had never cut you out of my life like I did. But I’m so glad I got to know you, Hayes. Even if it did require my clothes literally falling off my body in public. I would do it all over again just to meet you.”

I took a step closer to where she stood, thinking I could hug her. But instead, I shoved my hands in my pockets. “I don’t know what to say,” I stammered, finally finding some words, though they were all the wrong ones.

“That’s okay.” Her voice cracked, but she was smiling. Her face was shining like I’d never seen it do before, like a brand-new penny. “I should go.”

“Wait, what?” I blinked, trying to process all that was happening in real time.